Seeing the World Through Google-Colored Glasses

I was having a discussion yesterday with my DH (dear husband, for those not officially knowing the geek-lingo. You're forgiven.) and we were discussing the myriad of choices that are facing the consumer every day. 250 television channels. 25 movies just playing at my local megaplex alone. A gazillion books. Three gazillion CD's, etc. You get the idea. The more choices we're provided with, the more we need a filter. I told him that I thought conventional wisdom, or popular opinion was becoming that filter, and then he said: "Yeah. Like Google." Apparently, in their search acronym, google provides a ranking based on number of sites that are linking to the pages that contain the words in the search box. If you google "Kathleen O'Reilly," my site comes up first because more sites list "Kathleen O'Reilly" as a link to my homepage than any other pages containing "Kathleen O'Reilly". By Google's rules, popular opinion is the filter that I see the results by.

So, for instance, when I go into Barnes & Noble, or Target, or FYE (music store), the records that are placed up front, the one people are drawn to, is the choices made by millions of consumers before them. It's American Idol everywhere you look. According to the US General Accounting Office, the American household is provided an average of 88 different channels, yet the average viewer only views 17. More choice doesn't change the outcome of what you watch. So how does the consumer respond to this cacophony of demands? By picking out what other people watch, buy, read or listen to. Our brains are getting googled.

Recently, the Discovery Channel had a poll about the greatest American ever. The answer? Ronald Reagan. Right there above Abraham Lincoln and Martin Luther King, Jr. Now, I like Ronald Reagan, but I think Mr. Lincoln did a heck of a lot more for the country. And MLK. Apparently 2.4 million people voted, and I can't find the actual number of votes for Pres Reagan, but I can't help but wonder if those people were guided by conventional wisdom rather than facts.

What role does conventional wisdom play in your decision-making process? I admit, even being the individual that I am, I want to find out more about the books on the besteller list and I'm more inclined to buy music that other people are talking about. With television, I'm my own couch-potato, although I do love Lost and 24.

I haven't decided whether decision by group-think is a good thing or bad. It's obvious that the average consumer can't wade through 100 gazillion choices every day without help, but I've always marched to my own drummer, and it worries me that we're turning into the Borg, a world-wide collective, where the individual is silenced.